Akinwumi Adesina, the president
of the Africa Development Bank, says 98 percent of women repay their loans.

Speaking at the first ever Africa
Investment Forum (AIF) in Sandton, South Africa, Adesina said if women had the
resources available to men, the gross domestic product (GDP) of the world will
go up by 26 percent.

“If the world today has the same
resources for women that it has for men, you would be able to increase the GDP
of the world by 26 percent,” Adesina said.

“And in case of Africa, that GDP
will go up by an additional 12 percent. So it makes sense, economic sense, to
invest in women.

“That is where the challenge
really is, the women don’t have access to finance. If you look at the financing
gap that women have, it is roughly anything around $42 billion in terms of
financing businesses for women in Africa today.

“Take agriculture, that is
probably another $12 billion gap for financing for women.”

“Women, we know, payback on their
loans; 98 percent payback on their loan. So, what sense does it make that you
are telling me that you are not goin to be lending to women that pay back 98
percent of their loans.

“I am sure the balance of two
percent is probably their husbands in a way telling them that they shouldn’t go
and pay. The point I am trying to make is that women are bankable!”

Adesina said the AfDB is doing
what it can to ensure that banks in Africa lend more to women, and rejig the
financial system.

“Women pay back their loans, we
have to develop new financing instruments that allows us to lend more to women,
not based on collateral, because there is nothing better than the collateral of
your repayment rate,” he added.

“Let us rejig and tune the
financial market towards women, and that is why for us at AfDB, everything we
do is to make sure that we do that.

“We give quite a lot of financing
to women through intermediary financing institutions. and we hold banks
accountable to what the do for women.

“For example, we just did
Fidelity Bank in Nigeria $50 million, and 30 percent of it will go to
businesses of women.”